Of the Big 4 (VET, RAI, ALO and HAM), I get this feeling that whenever Hamilton has a dog of a car for the weekend or suffers some terrible mishap during the race, he just loses all motivation and tends to not do well. Am I alone in thinking so? It seems that he loses morale very easily. I’ve seen it a few times this year, and also at McLaren at certain races in the past where the car was rubbish.

Of the four, I can see that Alonso and Vettel tend to punch above their weight and strive for the best even when in bad cars for the weekend, while Raikkonen is easily off form even when the car is good or not (his problem is interest in general), but still he has punched above his weight in certain cases (2004, early 2009 and in the past few seasons).

I don’t know. He has been kinda weak in the last couple of races, but the strategies from Mercedes have also been weird as hell. How much of his weak performances are due to him or due to the strategies alone is hard to know.

He had a remarkable first half of the season though, on a car that wasn’t really built around him, so I really want to see his 2014.

I’ve felt this for a while to be honest – particularly during 09 when he’d have strops over the radio and there’s been a couple of races with McLaren when he had damage early on and would basically say “there’s no point, let’s just retire”. His head does tend to drop but if he’s in the groove with the car and in a bad position then he just goes for it. I think it just depends on his mood to be honest.

Sometimes I think this could be true, but in general this season I think Hamilton has just been harder on the tyres than Rosberg generally, so strategy doesn’t work to his benefit and he drops into traffic. Spain was such a case – “I’ve just been passed by a Williams” and he finished 11th. Maybe an attacking more stop race would have done them better there, as Alonso romped home on an aggressive 4 stop. So maybe better strategy – but today, undercutting Massa like Rosberg would have just left Hamilton with no tyres again at the end of the race, as a sitting duck, unless the clean air running would have helped him with this.

But there were also cases like Monaco – going too slow under the safety car, losing two positions and a certain 2nd place and team 1-2. So really, Hamilton has to work on his mental/intelligence capabilities to be performing at the level of Vettel, Alonso, Raikkonen when on full form (i.e. along with his team/equipment/strategy being right), else he might not win another title, as top level consistency is required unless you have a massive car advantage and simply beat your team-mate.

I think he’s fallen away a little in the second half of this season, but I wouldn’t say it’s true generally. He was for instance, taking pole positions (4 in a row) after thinking the car was struggling in early parts of a weekend. He also had a dramatic improvement in 2009 after the car struggled early in the season.

After reading this I wonder how on earth he was able to be so perfect in his rookie season, he (just partly!) outraced and outrun a double WC. Sort of , every season since 07-08 is less good than his debut. And in contrast to Vettel (especially), who is improving every season but was less good comapared to Ham i 08-2010, – Hamilton is kind of stubborn on his speed and overtaking ability, but hasn’t added anything to his skill set in recent years.

This^ is just my impression. I see Lewis as a top 6 driver today based on 2013 form, and thats about it. Rosberg almost as good as him.

The 07-08 era was about pushing out qually laps all race long, and the top 2 cars were easily clear, matched occasionally by BMW. Since Pirelli came back, it’s now about adapting to using a tyre over its whole life. Hamilton can do this, but I think his best strength is when it’s a pushfest. Hence his seeming decline.

Also, maybe Hamilton is past his peak – he’s been doing this for a long time, and was the star driver on his way up the ladder. Read his profile on CIK-FIA! 2000 season – beats Rosberg, Ardigo (2 time WKC, co-incidentally 07-08), and Kubica! Now that’s top quality, when to come home in the top 4 you have to either beat a World Champion or F1 race winner!

Arguably, Vettel is at his peak from 2011-13 so far, although he was very handy before that and similarly dominant at a junior level. Seems he can fit his style perfectly to the current tyres, and his adaptability may be Vettel’s greatest strength. The comparisons with Clark/Lotus are quite apt in this sense. Here, Webber would be Graham Hill – give him what he can drive well and he can equally win across many series, while also doing well on the classic tracks! But in the same F1 team he was second fiddle to the lead driver.

Can you blame the guy? Today a guy that’s younger than him won his 4th WDC while he went back 3 positions.

If he’s driving the best his last team worked overtime to find a way to screw him. You don’t see Khedira fouling Ronaldo as he’s about to score, do you?

If he’s leading the race his tire explodes and his teammate wins.

If he has a good start like last week, his tire gets clipped and Vettel has zero damage – goes without saying, a missile can hit Vettel and it will probably move him up in the race:-)

If he’s on one of his favorite tracks (Montreal) and about to pass his teammate, Button hits him, Lewis’ car is destroyed while Button’s probably gets a 10% aero performance boost and magically wins the race from dead last:-)

If everything is going great, Massa or the FIA will make sure it doesn’t stay that way for long (Spa 2008 and a billion occasions in 2011).

On top of that, he’s now got to drive really, really slow to save the tires. And DRS has turned everyone into Lewis in terms of overtaking.

Plus now he’s showing some questionable judgment in his starts while he’s on the front row or 2nd row.

And if that doesn’t happen, then his girlfriend will surely break up with him to seal the deal…

It’s actually shocking that he has won anything in F1 or any other competition…

He has massive talent but like Dave Hobbs and Newey said today numerous times, talent is completely IRRELEVANT without the car/team and everything else that’s needed to win.

Anyone here, is sure or has proof that Bernie doesn’t like Lewis to win? I also want to point out, that the 2007-2008 McLaren cars were “a part of Newey’s” Hamilton said that once in an interview that they were a little bit made from Newey.
Yes among the top 4 Hamilton is the best in terms of qualifying laps and total power, but not mind power. He needs tyres that can last, if he has it, he can do anything with it.
Yes, I am a die hard Lewis fan, and yes there are people like this, who can really get down after something gets wrong and really wrong. I am like this as well.
Hamilton among the top 4 has to have the worst luck of all. Probably Vettel is the next prone to bad luck then Kimi and Alonso. Remember that Kimi, Vettel and Hamilton suffered reliability issues costing title wins. Raikkonen in 2005, Vettel in 2010, and Hamilton in 2012. He has unbelievable talent, it’s a shame that he doesn’t have a little luck at least since 2008. But this season, I really can’t believe that Lewis had a shot at the title until the “Vettel show came”. I know that he wants the best, he is never satisfied unless he wins.

@krichelle I can’t fault Hamilton for the tyres – Pirelli has somehow managed to bring anti-racing Grand Touring tyres to F1:-) If a driver tries to pass anyone and they don’t have the pace, they destroy the tyres.

It’s preposterous – they’ve introduced DRS while reducing “real passes” because of the tyre deg impact… Hamilton couldn’t use the DRS on Massa and he used up his tyres trying to pass him.

Mate, I know you can’t fault for the tyres because the drivers need to adapt, but this weekend Hamilton admitted that he delivered poorly. I also saw that Rosberg was better than him in the weekend, but not in race pace which is why I was shocked to see that Rosberg was given the better strategy. I do get it why Merc split the strategy, because they are chasing 2nd place in the constructors, and good job that Nico capitalized on that while Hamilton did what he could to help even more.
Lewis’ weakness tend to be at the start where after the first couple of corners there is a very long straight, example Korea, India, Spa. Because he loses positions most of the time there, than in the whole race. Hamilton did use DRS but since the break, Mercedes have decided to make their car more balanced, reducing quali pace and improving race pace, which I believe stopped the challenge that Lotus or Ferrari could do, because when Nico or Lewis was on pole, Alonso and Raikkonen still had a shot to win the race.

Glad I can comment here, I am being attack by the haters cause I am a neutral fan, a fan who is fair to everyone, cause I am being attacked by Vettel, Hamilton, Alonso and Kimi haters everywhere I post comments about races. Especially, when there is an accident involving those mentioned above.

I think I’ve said something about this around Monaco. As someone else mentioned, in 2009 he would get rather dramatic sometimes about his car’s performance, as he did again earlier this year. He also looked somewhat dented from time to time in 2011, especially when Massa came up to him during an interview.

I think Hamilton has a problem controlling his emotions; although that sounds way harsher than it probably is. I don’t mean to imply he is crying behind the wheel or something; but his emotional state (in general) will affect his mental state during a weekend. We’ve seen him underperform when he had trouble with Nicole, we’ve seen him on a high when he was visibly confident and in a happy place.

Don’t underestimate what (I believe) Martin Withmarsh said in 2009 about Hamilton and his junior career; he always was with the best team, the best equipment and the most famous series. If you’re growing up, winning everything, you’re not going to learn how to lose. I’m not calling Hamilton spoiled; I’m saying his emotional development might have taken a wrong turn somewhere and he is now suffering the consequences.